Letter to the editor

An opinion article was written for the Linfield Review titled “Last Thursday’s defeat: Bidding farewell to the last female presidential candidate.” This article said that Elizabeth Warren, having ended her campaign for president after Super Tuesday, was the last female presidential candidate and now all we have to vote for are men.

And it continues with the many ways that women are oppressed by men, specifically white men. At the risk of coming off as a provocative crazy person, I contend that this title is a bold-faced lie. The last female candidate for president was not Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, but Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, who is still in the race. Gabbard is far more moderate than any of her primary opponents despite trailing behind Biden and Sanders with a paltry two delegates.

The author of the article wrote “Warren ending her campaign after a lackluster performance on Super Tuesday just reinforces the false notion that women, innately and through no reason apart from our gender, are just less electable than men.” On this, the author and I can completely agree. The notion that women are less electable than men is demonstrably false. So, let’s look at some facts. (1) according to the US Census Bureau, females make up 50.8% of the American population, a slight majority. (2) women make up only a quarter of Congress, specifically 25 senators and 101 representatives, both of which are historical highs. (3) Women have had the inalienable right to vote through the 19th amendment since August 18, 1920.

Considering these, when the author writes “…there are still men electing other men to positions of political power,” it would appear to me that the only group of people stopping women from being elected to public office is other women.

To further push the point that women are institutionally oppressed by men, the author cites a lack of female representation in leadership positions in the private sector. Again, this seems to imply that it is men who are keeping women from being CEOs and top earners.

However, countless studies have shown that the reason women don’t usually become CEOs or go into other leadership positions is because women, in general, choose not to.

There is a reason why the nursing and teaching industries are dominated by women. When deciding which industry or career to pursue, people often make trade-offs. In a free and rich society, men and women make different choices. Be the change you wish to see.

For the women reading this, if you want to see more female CEOs, come up with an idea and figure out how to market it. If you want to see more women in public office, run for public office. Personally, I don’t [care] about a person’s race, ethnicity, or gender when deciding who to vote for. I vote for the person who most closely aligns with my political viewpoints.

But for those feminists who insist on supporting candidates over male candidates in politics, I ask you this simple question: why don’t you support the only woman currently running for president?

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The headline of the opinion piece “Last Thursday’s defeat: Bidding farewell to the last presidential candidate” was misleading when it was first published. When another editor pointed out the factual error the secondary headline was added right away, so we apologize for any confusion. The rest of that piece was solely an opinion, and published in the Opinions section. We appreciate the time taken to write to the Linfield Review.

1 Comment

One Response to “Letter to the editor”

Garrett Crouch on
March 25th, 2020 4:44 am

This is exactly right. Elizabeth Warren did not win a single primary and even placed third in her own state of Massachusetts, losing by 11 points to Joe Biden. Among female voters, she lost by 10 points to Joe Biden. Did all the women in her state internalize the patriarchy? Are all of them self-hating women? Or is it perhaps because Warren is an incredibly inauthentic politician and her platform was full of radical and unpopular policies.

There is nothing stopping women with great ideas from running and winning seats in public office, but to do so you have to run strong and popular candidates—two more groups where Elizabeth Warren’s heritage does not originate.